


Weighting the rolling dice

by Aoida_blue



Category: Batman (Comics), DCU - Comicverse, Under the Red Hood
Genre: Broken Birds, Gen, Implied Relationships, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-28
Updated: 2011-12-28
Packaged: 2017-10-28 07:35:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,016
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/305411
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aoida_blue/pseuds/Aoida_blue
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hurt, Jason was always so hurt. He carried it like a weapon he’d never had to holster, pressed the barrel against his own head, finger shaking on the trigger.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Weighting the rolling dice

**Author's Note:**

> My god. This pairing has eaten my brain. Its * embarrassing* the amount of unfinished fic I have for these two.

“He couldn’t do it for me.”

 

Jason’s voice came from everywhere, sound reverberating across the room and Dick held himself still. The knife was solid in Jason’s hand in his warping shadows and meant much more, much more, than the distant, echoing threats.

 

“Could he do it for you?”

 

Dick shrugged, sliding a foot backward into an easier stance, watching the shadows flicker around the room.

 

“Wouldn’t want him too.” Dick said, tone causal like this was a talk on the street between friends, not an abandoned warehouse with Jason and a knife.

 

He didn’t know though. Didn’t know if their positions were reversed if Dick could honestly say the same. Didn’t want to think about it.

 

Jason’s laugh bounced against the walls, dancing around Dick, coming at him from every shadow, every distant flicker. It dipped, hurt and angry in the way that Jason always was, hurt and angry in the same way that made Dick stiffen with guilt, grief and sheer annoyance, emotions wrapped and tangled. Knots upon knots and leaving Dick sick for days after, just like Jason always made him feel.

 

“Aren’t you good? Aren’t you perfect?” Jason’s voice cooed at him, mocking and steeped in his twisted beliefs.

 

Dick breathed out steadily. Jason was always so wrong when it came to Dick. Always had been.

 

Jason could never see him clearly, had never seen him clearly. Not when he was a kid with eyes full of wonder nor a teen with a challenging slant of the head, not now when he was the broken and pushed back together killer. If he had he would have known….

 

Dick had never been perfect. He’d been good, yeah, sure, all of Batman’s adoptions were _good_. Dick had just never been good _enough_.

 

Once, selfishly, he’d thought Jason was proof of that.

 

“Jason.” Dick attempted, his own voice echoing, but duller, plainer than Jason’s rich taunts, “We don’t have to do this.”

 

There was no reply. No flicker of shadows, and Dick’s ears rang with the silence. Piecing white noise.

 

“You don’t either. None of this.” The words felt heavy, too desperate from Dick, too wrong coming from Dick, _not good enough_ , “Its never too late. Just come with me.”

 

Finally, finally, there was a sound, a small choke that came from above. Dick looked up but there was nothing, nothing but dark ceiling, plain and bear, nothing but naked scaffolding. Empty.

 

“And you’d what? Wrap your arm around me? Walk me out of here and forget about all the _bad_ _bad_ men I’ve killed?” Jason’s words grew louder, choked sounding, anger rising, rising and hysteria creeping in, “Pretend that your _pure_ heart could _forgive_ my rotten one? Would we go back to the mansion and have Alfred’s tea with _our not father_ who never cared enough, who’d let my murderer kill again?”

 

The words shattered around Dick and he weathered it out, eyes open, careful for any sudden movement toward him.

 

Hurt, Jason was always so _hurt_. He carried it like a weapon he’d never had to holster, pressed the barrel against his own head, finger shaking on the trigger. 

 

“If you’d like.” Dick returned dryly into the silence heaving like uneven breaths, “But I’d take just walking out of here, maybe even seeing your face over my own dinner table. Granted, its not the mansion and I’m no Alfred, but it is close by.”

 

Don’t pull the trigger. Every time Dick talked to Jason, he was talking him down. _Don’t pull the trigger._

 

A low chuckle, not manic sounding, not so angry, just sort of sad, sad and still _hurt_ , filled the room.

 

“Dickie, Dickie,” Jason sighed, and the room sighed with him, “It doesn’t work like that. The game board’s set up, Daddy dearest did that for you, now we must play.”

 

The first two robins had always been compared, one explained by the other, like two halves of a circle, a yin and yang. Dick was acrobatic compared solid Jason, Jason’s anger came in fire burts whereas Dick’s festered cold till he could bare it no longer. Dick was the first, Jason was the second, look at how _different they are_.

 

“I’m not playing.” Dick said, finally, mustering his smile up, grin and perform, always a Grayson, _never forget that_ , “Never liked board games really. Always for the more physical. But I’ll verse you in twister if you like?”

 

Jason’s laugh sounded different, warmer somehow, sadder somehow. A contradiction like everything Jason was, the dead boy who lived, the Robin who killed. Dick just wanted to see him, put a face to that sound and _understand_ like he never been able to do.

 

Jason couldn’t see Dick and Dick couldn’t understand Jason.

 

“Dickie,” Jason drawled, slow, telling Dick he was foolish, _foolish_ , “you don’t have a choice.”

 

Yin and yang was what everyone had said about the first two Robins, forever different, forever fighting.

 

Dick didn’t subscribe to that theory.

 

“I don’t buy that.” Dick decided to move, leaping easily to the rail about his head, walking tightrope fast to the small window, an eye out case Jason made his move.

 

This would go on and on, this conversation could stretch for days and years and neither of them would tire of words to say. No. They both knew the meaning of words, they’d both been raised by the same man, and they both knew how actions always, always, spoke louder.

 

To get through to Jason, Dick needed to shout.

 

Dick slipped his legs out the window, breathing in heavy Gotham air, and turned back inside.

 

The silence inside was thick, Jason’s silence was thick. Dick tried to smile, tried to start speaking louder.

 

 “No board games, no other players, dinner tomorrow.” Dick felt the thrill of a dice roll, a gamble, a risk, and ran his fingers along the edge of the window, “You know where I live.”

 

The dice was rolling, rolling and Dick knew Jason would ruin the results if he stayed.  Instead Dick leapt clear into the air, grapple shooting off and swung high into the sky. 


End file.
